Bilateral talks with India fruitful, says Nepal PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal

Shimla: Nepalese Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal on Saturday said the bilateral talks with his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi had been fruitful and strengthened the relations between the two neighbouring countries.

"Dil se baat hui khul ke baat Hui"(we talked with open heart) and both the countries found new grounds to move forward, Dahal who is popularly known as Prachanda told reporters.

He said Nepal would not allow its land to be used for activities against neighbouring countries.

Prachanda, who was at Jahakri in Shimla district, 145 km from here to inspect the 1500MW Nathpa-Jhakri Hydropower Project of SJVNL was responding a question regarding efforts of Pakistan to use Nepal for terrorist activities against India.

"Nepal would not allow its land to be misused for activities against the neighbouring countries", he said adding that India is friendly country and we have good relations with it.

Prachanda who felt at home in serene hills said that the "topography, geography, trees, jungles people and culture of India and Nepal is similar and I feel that I am not in India but in Nepal".

After visiting the Project, Prachanda also talked to a gathering of people of Nepali origin working in various projects.

The SJVNL engineers took the Nepalese Prime minister around and informed him about various features of the project in detail.

The SJVNL CMD R N Mishra gave a power point presentation about the Nathpa-Jhakri and 412 MW Rampur projects executed by SJVNL and also exhibited the model of Arun-3 (900) MW being executed in Nepal.

He said that a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) had already been signed with India in May, 2014 for commissioning of 900 MW Arun-3 hydro power project and expressed satisfaction over Nathpa-Jhakri project.

Union Minister for Power, Piyush Goyal said that Arun-3 hydro-electric project was a beginning of new chapter in strengthening bilateral relations between India and Nepal and the work on this project would be expedited.

He said that India and Nepal are working together on few more projects also and it was a matter of great satisfaction
that the neighbouring nation had expressed faith in India to go ahead with these projects.